Articles

In April this year, a call was made at a book launch by a bourgeois
lawyer and an acclaimed legal scholar, Professor Ben Nwabueze, on the
need for a bloody revolution in Nigeria. A journalist, Sulaimon
Olanrewaju, a reporter with the Nigerian TRIBUNE, covered the
event. Part of his report published on the 4th of April 2008 read thus:
"Prominent Nigerians including Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos
State, Professor Ben Nwabueze, Lieutenant General Theophilus Danjuma,
Chief Olisa Agbakoba, NBA president and Chief Orji Kalu, former Abia
State governor, on Thursday called for a revolution to wrest the
country from the grips of underdevelopment. The people, who spoke at
the public presentation in Lagos of three books by Prof. Ben Nwabueze,
former secretary general of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, however, disagreed on the
form the revolution should take. While Nwabueze, Kalu, Agbakoba
and Bola Tinubu, former Lagos State governor advocated a bloody
revolution, Fashola, Danjuma, Chief GOK Ajayi opted for a peaceful
revolution." {Emphasis mine}

And since that call, some journalists and public commentators have
shifted base and joined the fray. To be candid, the ruling class are
not bereft of qualitative ideas on ways to move Nigeria forward. The
problem is that class interest has ruined its members' sense of
reasoning. The chic of it is that the tiny minority does not want any
surgical change that will alter drastically its privileged position.
And that, is the dilemma with "Big men" democracy. They are so selfish
that they are not prepared to sacrifice for the common good of all.
They only "make their private interest look like a universal interest".

Part blame for our continual down ward slope into the abyss should
be placed at the door steps of the 49 wise men who drafted the 1979
bourgeois constitution. The trickle down effect of that ÔÇśRank Zerox'
American constitution is what we are going through to this day. That
constitution was not done with the interest of Nigeria's component
nationalities at heart. The document was one of the pillars of
foundation for the booming strings in the legal profession. I believed
that Nigerian has more lawyers than all the other countries in the West
African sub-region put together. This is because the more cheats and
crooks the system generates the more the lawyers. A country seduced by
political leadership whose penchant for stealing is never in doubt. A
country where most individuals tell lies even to themselves and steal
what belongs to them; where a "good morning", accompanied with a hand
shake, has other subdued meanings. Social consciences are now bought
and sold at Oshodi market.

The generality of the people never enjoyed that constitution. It was
a well packaged fraud. It was one of the most expensive constitutions
to run in a neo-colonial, primitive and an underdeveloped capitalist
economy. And since 1979 Nigerian lawyers with the active connivance of
a thieving tiny political cabal have held sway. They have become part
of our enigma. They drafted the electoral laws and yet go to court to
give different sections of it, various divergent and conflicting
interpretations, leaving the country in a steady state of "ALARM"
situation. Most lawyers don't give a hoot whether Nigerians live or
die. Majority of them simply defend the unjust social order to hilt
irrespective of its devastating impact on the lives of their fellow
being. Everybody wants to read law and become a lawyer. After which the
person joins the aiding and abetting club of liars to speak big grammar
and bend logic using big technical terms like "locus standi", "onus of proof" and "due process". While Nigerians eagerly await for a true locus standi and onus of proof, corruption is being beautified by lawyers with their sugar-coated tongues.

There are very few social lawyers, the rest are cockroaches
and mosquitoes - pest to a whole nation. The NBA cannot even fight for
the total independence of the judiciary talk less of doing same for the
Police Force or the Electoral Commission. And they know the relevance
of such independence in the promotion of enduring democracies in the
advanced clime. Through their devious and covertly insidious activities
in courts, these shameless lawyers encourage and induce people to
steal, then go ahead to help the thieves to adjourn cases of corruption
to no end. The law, which is supposed to act as a deterrent to these
infectious acts and to well established electoral fraud amd
malpractices, is now used to aid and abet criminals. Check out their
legal fees and how many corrupt cases have had adjournments now and
then! The EFCC now looks seemingly comatose. The agency's problems are
compounded by these greedy lawyers who virtually behave like native
doctors.Wonders shall never end in that country. We are fighting many
wars at different fronts.

Besides, Nigerians can count on Chief Gani Fawehinmi {SAN}, Chief
Femi Falana, Chief Olisa Agbakoba {SAN}, Festus Keyamo and Bamidele
Aturu among others who are fighting for justice using the law as one of
the most effective tools for social engineering. These are the people's
lawyers. When these personalities call for a revolution, the
enlightened ones among the masses will listen attentively. What ever
money Chief Gani had made, he used most, in fighting for the cause of
the down trodden. Thus when Professor Ben Nwabueze called for a bloody
revolution, I just asked: what brand of revolution? Is it a bourgeois,
a working class, cultural or a peasant revolution? I am sure he meant a
bourgeois revolution which would cleanse the indiscipline among members
of the ruling class and then return the system to the usual status quo.
A shameless political class that sold out on June 12 over a clip of
films.

But, does a revolution come because people call for it? Are
revolutions no longer historically conditioned? Apart from Dr. Edwin
Madunagu, Balarabe Musa, Professors Eskor Toyo, Attahiru Jega and
Omafume Onoge, Chief Gani Fawehinmi, Festus Iyayi, Femi Falana,
Bamidele Aturu, where are the rest revolutionary intellectuals? Is the
working class, the peasants, market women and other smaller oppressed
and pauperised groups ready for it? Who will lead the revolution in
such a way that the leader will not later be accused of tribalism,
regional and religious bias? These questions need to be placed on a
scale and weighed before one can talk about a revolution in Nigeria. We
must learn from our history. It is easy to mouth, shout and write,
calling for it, but are we also ready for its bloody twist and turns
and final outcome?

"In the history of contemporary period," writes Professor Eskor Toyo
in a paper presented at Kano in {1981} in honour of late Dr. Bala
Muhammed titled PRP: IDEOLOGY AND REVOLUTION, "there are at least five ways by which a revolutionary party or group has come to power.

1. It may do so by an armed insurrection as in Russia in 1917,
Eastern Europe at the end of the second world war, Cuba and Nicaragua.

2. It may do so by assuming the leadership of and radicalising an
anti-colonial armed revolution as in Vietnam, North Korea, Angola or
Mozambique.

3. It may do so by a military coup d'etat staged by revolutionary elements in the established armed forces as in Afganistan, Ethiopia, Benin Republic or Rawlings' Ghana.

4. It may do so through victory in a referendum as in the case of Guinea.

5. It may do so through victory in an election as in the case of the
Convention People's Party in Ghana and in the experiences of Guyana."

The third option would have been realized by Major Nzeogwu and his
fellow comrades in Nigeria on January 15, 1966 but for the failure of
that revolutionary coup in the South. That third option was also
realised in Libya in 1969. Again, the fifth option would have been
realized in Nigeria but for the annulment of June 12, 1993 election
which the progressives won but could not claim. However, the fifth
option was profoundly realised in Venezuela in 1998 when Hugo Chavez,
one of the most progressive and revolutionary great thinker of recent
times, won election in a landslide victory. That victory was an
undiluted victory for popular democracy despite all dubious efforts by
America to thwart it. Funny USA, today they are celebrating what they
always want to deny others!

However, if history should be our guide, in 1966, Majors Nzeogwu,
Ademoyega, Ifeajuna, Anuforo, and Okafor led what they called a
military "revolution" to save Nigeria from the throes of chaos and
anomy orchestrated by bad political leadership. Even though a
particular tribal group and region benefited from the fallout of that
coup, we all knew the interpretation most people gave and still give to
the coup? Now, knowing most Nigerians for their ability to manipulate
tribe and religion, who will lead a people's revolution this time
around such that one ethnic or tribal group will not accuse the rest of
killing people mostly from its region?

What are the overriding social indicators that cut across tribes and
ethnic groups which could stimulate the people into action? Where lies
the common social denominator? Are the Nigerian working class, who
daily bear the brunt of exploitation of our rugged neo-colonial
capitalism, conscious and united enough? Where are the remainder of the
Bakolori peasants of Sokoto who survived the slaughter in the 1980 of
Shagari's use of brute force and death squads to ruthlessly suppress
their uprisings? Are there other willing peasants across the country
who are ready to join forces with the working class to blow away this
unjust order? What about the interventionist tendency of a section of
the International community in the whole set up? Have we forgotten the
deaths of Patrice Lumumba of Congo Zaire, Amilcar Cabral of Guinea
Bissau and Walter Rodney of Guyana etc, etc? Do we think the US and
Britain with their scattered global network of spy masters, would fold
their arms and allow Nigeria to fall into the hands of progressive
nationalists at the detriment of their investments, big market and
dangerous cravings for crude oil?

There is no doubt that the oppressed Nigerians know who their
enemies are. The masses know their targets. It is a few cabal, resident
in both North and South. They are less than 2% of the population. But,
these targets are not soft targets. They are clever too and are fast
thinkers. However, the only factor that counts against them is their
number. They know it! And because they know it, they use other forms of
control to check the angst of the masses. Most of us know these
palliative forms and tactics. We don't need to look afar for one. Just
visit the NVS websites and read comments planted by presumably mental
adults about a particular piece of article or articles to see the
divisive nature of enlightened and educated Nigerians. It is like war.
People just pick any aspect of history that suits them, interpret it
with hate and then embellish and garnish it with falsehood and flash it
for the public to consume. They then beat their chest in retreat, go to
bed and holler; "oh yes, I have dealt a blow on them, let them respond,
and I will give them another salvo"! This is very, very unfortunate. I
cry for my beloved country. Now, with those type of mindsets, how then
do we carry out a revolution even if it is a bourgeois revolution?

The fact is that one of such baits was easily summoned and used to
bastardised Nzeogwu's coup which some of our educated Nigerians bought
and swallowed hook, line and sinker. I will repeat again for the
umpteenth time, that in analysing Nzeogwu's revolutionary coup, the
moment you divorce the social context of that revolution from the
personalities deeply involved, the tendency is that your conclusion
will be false. Background history to that coup must be accounted for
and analysed pari passu with the personalities involved
otherwise if you focus on the personalities only, then be rest assured
you will end up on a wrong dangerous premise. Scare mongers and
intellectuals who are very good at spreading panic and fear, will then
push you to fall into negative intellectual tendencies and bourgeois
ideological fancies of tribe, ethnicity, religion, and region. That has
been the bane in the unscientific analyses of Nzeogwu's coup. And that
I can safely foretell, is most likely going to be the bane of any
revolution of whatever variant in Nigeria.

However, if the revolution {see Toyo's option one} is properly and
uniformly coordinated whenever it starts, a true leader will emerge
from it. A true revolution throws up its own leader. Properly and
uniformly coordinated in this context means the ability of the
oppressed groups in the present six regions to carry out a revolution
in uniformity. A situation where for instance, two regions have started
the revolt while the other four are mere spectators will make the
revolution not only a laughing stock but a failure. History is replete
with examples. Major Nzeogwu's revolutionary coup was regionalised and
tribalised because it failed in the South. An example of peaceful
revolution, as advocated by GOK Ajayi, T.Y Danjuma and Fashola, was the
June 12, 1993 presidential election. It was a bloodless national
revolution because of its scope of success but some of us who were on
the ground then, were witnesses to the way the Nigerian bourgeoisies
regionalized, tribalised and destroyed its popular essence.

What then can trigger a revolution in Nigeria? Simple answer: when
poverty and hunger has reached an unbearable and intolerable level, the
people will react. Therefore, I appeal to progressive forces to
encourage president Musa Yaradua to keep implementing economic policies
that will spread more poverty, hunger, unemployment, armed robbery,
evil and wickedness on the land. We should encourage him to pursue and
implement more anti-peoples' policies that would bite the generality of
Nigerians harder. In fact, we ought to urge him on, to please increase
the pump price of petrol from its present ÔÇślow price' to, at least,
a-thousand naira per litre and on and on. The price of kerosene, gas
and diesel fuel should be quadrupled. All subsidies should be removed.
The government should be encouraged to retrench workers and to be
ruthless with whoever dares to challenge the STATE. Yes, we should urge
him on."We must see" the coming of "a revolution from the perspective
of the poor" and not from the perspective of the rich. The rich, by
calling for a tongue-in-cheek revolution, are merely sizing up the poor.

Again, all opposing views on Yar'Adua's govt should be censored and
suppressed. We should stop our elusive fight against corruption and
allow leaders to do what pleases them with our common wealth. If we do
not encourage government thoughts along these lines, then we should bid
good bye to a revolution. Revolutions come when there is enormous
"discontent" deeply felt by the people "against discontent". At that
point, you could smell the revolt of the masses in the air and could
sniff it. It is then that the contradictions inherent in our
neo-colonial, primitive and underdeveloped capitalist system will
mature, rupture and then negate itself to bring forth a new social
order. I submit therefore, that it is only history that will determine
when, and the pattern, Nigeria's revolution will take, and not
proclamations and declaration from dubious quarters. I rest my case!

This brings to mind the versailles phenomenon or in Nigeria's case "Umaru Dikko phenomenon"

"Professing themselves to be wise, they have become fools.\" (Rom. 1:22)

THE VERSAILLES PHENOMENON

In pursuing globalism without any real thought about what the masses are thinking, the globalists may - in the end (and very unwittingly) - be digging their own graves. It is the great curse of all elites that they fail to perceive (until it's too late) the "disconnect" between themselves and the great bulk of "ordinary" people, and the resulting loathing and disgust they eventually elicit from those over whom they rule. This is what happened between the French Aristocracy and the French people on the eve of the French Revolution; it's what happened between the Russian Aristocracy and the Russian people on the eve of their revolution. It's what I call the "Versailles Phenomenon."

Versailles is located just outside Paris in a beautiful expanse of French countryside; it was built by Louis IV as an exquisite and very sumptuous hideaway (really, "playground") for the French Aristocracy who wanted to escape the mean, narrow streets of the vast slum that was Paris in those days, and the filthy, evil-smelling and nauseous rabble which populated those streets. The lawns and gardens which surrounded Versailles were supposed to be (and were in fact) the most magnificent in all world, and were filled with exotic plants and animals from all over the earth. It is reputed to have been the most beautiful place in Europe - indeed, it was much more than a simple palace (like Buckingham in England or Potsdam in Germany), but was in fact a magnificent and lavish series of apartment complexes where the whole of the French Aristocracy could meet and entertain itself without ever having to be concerned with (let alone see) the poverty which was everywhere apparent throughout France in the years preceding Louis VI.

So completely cut-off was the French Aristocracy at Versailles on the eve of the French Revolution, that when Marie Antonette, the French Queen, was told that the rabble in Paris had no bread to eat, she was reported to have said, "Let them eat cake." But what most people do not realize today is that she did not mean that as a cynical jest, she said it as one who - when told that a neighbour had run out of a particular brand of coffee - would tell them that they should drink tea instead (which she would have reason to presume they had on hand).She had no idea that what was meant here was that the people had NOTHING to eat. This is how great the "disconnect" between the French Aristocracy and the French people had become in France on the eve of the Revolution; neither had that self-same aristocracy any real idea of how hated they were by the French people. They were soon to find out! - the "Terror," which the Revolution unleashed, would make all that plain.

SO ALSO TODAY!! Why? - because that "disconnect" - the one that doomed the French Aristocracy in 1789 - is the same "disconnect" that Wall Street has with Main Street America - even today; the same one that Imelda Marcos had insofar as the Filipino people were concerned; the same one that Pinochet had with the Chilean people. And it's amazing and absolutely extraordinary to see the lengths to which this "disconnect" can extend itself. Imeldo Marcos? Pinochet? the Shah of Iran? - these leaders were not loved by their people, they were hated by them! - and for Marcos, Pinochet, the Shah, Suharto, and people like them to think otherwise is dizzying and stupefying in its absurdity. Yet this is the length to which elite disconnection can extend itself; thinking they are loved, they are hated; thinking that they are admired, the are held in absolute contempt; indeed,

That's what money does to people! - it disconnects them from ordinary people, and in the end, it utterly blinds them!!

@ the author,
You have substituted the quest for power with revolution. It is trite to define revolution as a negation of a socio-economic paradigm with its opposite. Hence, all historical revolutions that have shaped, and continue to shape the world, had overturned one social system and created another. Your examples did not meet this criteria, except the Russian and Cuban Revolutions. Let us fast forward to the present. As simplistic as this might sound, precisely what do we need to overthrow in Africa, or Nigeria , in our age? As recent events are showing, capitalism is in a deep crisis, globally. In fact, capitalism and the type of crisis it is undergoing exist hand-in-hand. To even contemplate a revolution therefore requires an attempt to overthrow it as it is. But what are its characteristics? Capitalism gave rise to the modern nation-state. A major factor in the demise of the Soviet Union was its inability to address the national question. Recall Lenin's famous remark? "Scratch a Bolshevik and you have a Great Russain Chauvinist." This was his reply to Stalin's "Bolshevisation" of Georgia, his home region.
When the European powers gathered in Berlin in 1884, their "civilising mission" was NOT to create modern nation-states in Africa, but to generate a crisis on the continent that will continually feed their economies. The first rule that was violated by African revolutionaries was therefore not aspiring to change the status quo. There was a disconnect, an intellectual/philosophical disconnect between the slave revolt in Haiti that gave the French the impetus for the "egalite, fraternite,and equalite" of western democracy and the "liberation" movements in Africa, no matter how enamoured we are with their struggles. Solidifying the new state became the motif. So, where do we go from here?
A revolution in Africa, or anywhere else for that matter, is a beckon to history. Rewriting and remaking of history. It is not just about strategies and tactics of taking political power; which is quite possible as in Nkruma or Lumumba, while the enemy retreats only to come out in full force and in more reactionary forms; Congo of today is a prime example.
The original Russian revolution of 1917 provides a clue to what is to come, in terms of negating what is; for us, the challenge is much more than just defending the paradigms set by the oppressor, but in overthrowing it; which is what revolution is all about.

Its easy for those who have done their part to destroy Nigeria such as Atiku Abubarkar, Bola Tinubu Orji Uzor Kalu etc to speak about revolution to distract the people from all the problems that they themselves helped put together. The real revolution lies with the people. When it comes, those politicians and their handlers will surely pay the price to the people. Their calls are not coming from a contrite heart but out of dubious mind to mislead the people. Will Nigeria ever escape this wind of change that is surely on its way to its borders? Time will prove how this all will come to pass and who will live to tell their stories.

Nigeria is drawing back other African countries and most especially, those nationalities within its borders back from development. The longer this revolution is delayed, the more the people will continue in their suffering. The beating of that poor lady in Lagos on November 3, 2008 was more than enough to trigger a reaction that will lead to something far reaching than corrupt politicians that get together to dine and wine and have some pet talk.

There is a global shift taking place right now and those systems that successive inept Nigerian leaders have tried copying have also failed. Democracy as a system of selecting leaders is still thriving but Capitalism which is another half of it is now failing woefully across the world. It will do Nigerian a lot of good to wake up and deal with criminal gangs that is holding the nation down.

Let the hunted learn how to hunt, and that will surely change the game of hunting.

Bode Eluyera,
Believe me I support your arguments and have read all your articles on Nigeria and the way forward. But the point is there are instances where to reach a particular destination, you have to look at various options. A revolution, if properly coordinated, can even result in splitting the country. A revolution is just like a referendum. The difference being that the people decided to impose it through mass revolt rather through voting.

Again, I do not know whether you were in the country during the Major Gideon Orkar led coup of 1990. That coup was termed by the Nigerian press "The resource control coup" principally because it was carried out by the SOUTH-SOUTH elements of the Nigerian army. Did you read the broadcast by Gideon Orka? Please read it and see the point. Just as us the civilians are frustrated by what is happening in Nigeria, it is not that well too within the army and the para military organizations.